The British legend received five Oscar nominations and starred in such films as 'Tom Jones,' 'The Dresser' and 'Erin Brockovich.'

Albert Finney, the esteemed British actor and five-time Oscar nominee known for his shape-shifting work in such films as Tom Jones, The Dresser, Murder on the Orient Express and Erin Brockovich, has died. He was 82.

Finney's family told the Associated Press on Friday that he "passed away peacefully after a short illness with those closest to him by his side." The actor was diagnosed with kidney cancer in 2007.

One of the godfathers of modern British cinema, Finney mixed film, TV and stage performances throughout a standout career that spanned six decades. He never succumbed to the allure of screen stardom and was given BAFTA's Academy Fellowship award (the equivalent of a lifetime Oscar) in 2001.

The restless actor also won an Emmy for portraying Winston Churchill opposite Vanessa Redgrave as his wife in the 2002 BBC-HBO telefilm The Gathering Storm.

The Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences bestowed best actor Oscar noms on Finney for playing the bawdy title character in the best picture winner Tom Jones (1963), directed by frequent collaborator Tony Richardson; for his work as the mysterious Belgian detective Hercule Poirot in Sidney Lumet's Murder on the Orient Express; for his performance as a temperamental, fading actor in Peter Yates' The Dresser (1983); and for starring as an alcoholic British consul in Under the Volcano (1984), helmed by John Huston.

Finney received another Oscar nom, for best supporting actor, for portraying the crusading California environmental lawyer Ed Masry in Erin Brockovich (2000).

Yet for all his nominations, he never once attended the Academy Awards ceremony. "It's a long way to go just to sit in a non-drinking, non-smoking environment on the off-chance your name is called," he told The Telegraph in 2011.

Perhaps the actor's showiest role was as the Prohibition-era Irish gangster Leo O'Bannon in the Coen brothers' Miller's Crossing (1990), where he fought off an ambush amid the strains of "Danny Boy."

He also played the bald and curmudgeonly Daddy Warbucks for Huston in Annie (1982).

David Lean originally selected him for the title role in Lawrence of Arabia (1962), but Finney turned it down because it required him to sign a multiyear studio contract. The part in one of the greatest films ever made went to, of course, Peter O'Toole.

More recently, Finney portrayed the evil psychologist Albert Hirsch in the Jason Bourne movies released in 2007 and 2012 and was seen as the Scottish gamekeeper Kincade in the 2012 James Bond installment Skyfall. That would mark his final onscreen appearance.

Legendary for his Shakespearean prowess, he also received Tony Award nominations in 1964 and 1968 for his work in Luther (as Martin Luther) and A Day in the Death of Joe Egg, respectively.

Finney's respect for acting, rather than the trappings of celebrity, allowed him to seek out parts for their character depth rather than the notoriety they might bring him. Often, he was unrecognizable under makeup or in costume, and he was known for his mastery of accents.

The son and grandson of bookmakers, Albert Finney Jr. was born on May 9, 1936, in Manchester, England. His childhood home was damaged by German bombs during World War II.

Finney graduated from the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art in 1955 and early on served as an understudy to Laurence Oliver. While filling in on stage for the famed actor in the title role in Coriolanus, he attracted notice and film offers.

Finney made his first feature appearance alongside Olivier in The Entertainer (1960) under Richardson, for whom he also frequently worked in the theater. In the "kitchen sink" drama Saturday Night, Sunday Morning (1960), he played the anti-hero Arthur Seaton, an angry factory worker mired in an environment, not unlike the one he experienced during his working-class upbringing.

Finney was considered one of most talented performers to come out of Britain in his country's '60s cinema heyday, but that did not dampen his enthusiasm for the theater, and he continued to perform on the U.K. stages, taking the lead in King Lear and Hamlet.

"When I worked those years at the National Theatre," Finney told The New York Times in 1983, "people were always saying that I could have been in Hollywood making this or that amount of money. But you must retain the ability to do what you want to do. I don't want to be a victim of supporting a lifestyle that you have to get huge salaries to support — even if you do things for nothing."

After he gained fame for his performance as the privileged 18th-century seducer in Richardson's Tom Jones, he put his career on hold to go sailing for a year.

Finney also starred in Stanley Donen's Two for the Road (1967), in which he played Audrey Hepburn's husband during three periods of their lives as they travel around Europe. (The two were reportedly involved romantically during filming.)

That same year, Finney also made his directorial debut in Charlie Bubbles (1967), starring opposite Liza Minnelli as a man facing midlife doldrums as well.

His other feature credits include Stephen Frears' Gumshoe (1971), Wolfen (1981), Looker (1981), Shoot the Moon (1982), Rich in Love (1992), The Browning Version (1994), A Man of No Importance (1994), Breakfast of Champions (1999), Traffic (2000), Big Fish (2003), Ridley Scott's A Good Year (2006) and Lumet's last film, Before the Devil Knows You're Dead (2007).

On television, he took on a demanding array of characters, playing the title role in the 1984 CBS telefilm Pope John Paul II and then the sexually promiscuous owner of a country inn in a 1990 BBC miniseries, The Green Man.

In 1977, Finney recorded an album of folk ballads that was released by Motown, and his life was said to serve as an inspiration for another famed Manchester native, singer Morrissey.

Finney was married to English actress Jane Wenham from 1957-61 to French actress Anouk Aimee (Oscar-nominated for A Man and a Woman, she left him for actor Ryan O'Neal) from 1970-78 and to travel agent Penelope Delmage since 2006.

She survives him, as does a son, veteran camera operator Simon Finney.

November 6, 2018

Rapper Mac Miller 26, died of accidental overdose of fentanyl, cocaine and alcohol

Mac Miller, a well-known producer and rapper, died from accidentally overdosing on a mixture of fentanyl, cocaine and alcohol in September, the Los Angeles County coroner said Monday.

Miller, 26, whose real name was Malcolm James McCormick, was found Sept. 7 in the bedroom of his Studio City home and pronounced dead at the scene by paramedics. A friend of Miller’s who called authorities told paramedics that the artist seemed to go into cardiac arrest, a source involved in the investigation told The Times in September.

Los Angeles police officials quickly determined there were no signs of foul play and turned the investigation over to coroner’s officials. Authorities at the time suspected he had overdosed but waited to make an announcement until toxicology tests had been completed.

The rapper had long struggled with drug and alcohol issues.

Shortly after his public split with singer Ariana Grande in May, Miller crashed his Mercedes-Benz G-Class SUV into a pole. The singer and two passengers fled the scene in the San Fernando Valley, but he was later arrested and charged with driving under the influence.

Miller was best known for his hits “Donald Trump,” “Self Care” and “Programs.” He garnered attention as a teenager in Pittsburgh with a series of mix tapes. Miller also worked as a producer under the name Larry Fisherman.

Miller’s struggles had played out in the tabloids, particularly his relationship with Grande.

In an interview published in August in Rolling Stone, Miller said that his breakup with Grande was difficult but that he was moving on with a new album.

“I’m just being real. That’s good. Now I have space for me. And that’s great too,” he told the magazine.

He also pushed back against concerns over his drug use.

“If a bunch of people think I am a huge drug addict, OK. Cool. What can I really do?” he said. “Have I done drugs? Yeah. But am I a drug addict? No.”

In an interview with Vulture, he said he tried not to worry about the headlines about him and what others think.

“It just seems exhausting to always be battling something … to always be battling for what you think your image is supposed to be. You’re never going to be able to get anything across. It’s never gonna be the real … No one’s gonna ever really know me,” he said.

In his last Instagram story before his death, Miller posted a video of a record player spinning “So It Goes,” the last track on his fifth studio album, “Swimming.” The song includes the lyric “Nine lives, never die … I’m still gettin’ high.”

August 27, 2018

John McCain, a titan in the U.S. Senate, was a consistent conservative, though unafraid to buck Republican Party leadership on issues ranging from campaign finance reform to the GOP-led effort to repeal the Affordable Care Act.

He died Saturday at age 81.

While the Arizona senator and two-time presidential candidate will be remembered for his self-proclaimed "maverick" persona, it was his military bloodlines and 5 1/2 years as a prisoner of war in Vietnam that shaped much of McCain's legacy.

McCain was the son of an admiral and grew up on naval bases both in the United States and around the world. McCain's grandfather was also an admiral, making them the first father and son four-star admirals in history of the U.S. Navy.

McCain followed his father and grandfather into the family business. He was a member of the U.S. Naval Academy's Class of 1958. While at the academy, he developed a reputation as a rambunctious and insubordinate student who received more than his share of reprimands.

He also maintained another family tradition while there, earning mediocre grades in the classroom.

"My father was here and his father before him. Like me, their standing was closer to the bottom than the top of their class," McCain told a 2017 class of Naval Academy graduates.

McCain finished fifth from the bottom of his class.

Despite his poor classroom performance, he was able to become a naval aviator. By the mid-1960s, the Vietnam War was raging and McCain's squadron was drawn into battle. At one point in 1967, McCain was almost killed after a wayward rocket from a nearby bomber hit his aircraft's fuel tank just before he was to take off from the USS Forrestal.

Explosions and fires from that incident killed more than 130 people aboard, but McCain managed to escape unscathed.

On Oct. 26, 1967, while on a bombing run over the North Vietnamese capital, Hanoi, his aircraft was struck by a Vietnamese ground based anti-aircraft missile.

"Just as I released the bombs and started to pull back on the stick, a surface-to-air missile took the right wing off my airplane. My airplane violently gyrated. I ejected," McCain recounted to C-SPAN in 2003.

The impact from the ejection knocked Lt. Cmdr. McCain unconscious, and he landed in the lake below.

Both McCain's arms were broken, so was his shoulder, and his knee was shattered. He was pulled out of the water by a Vietnamese mob and was stabbed, beaten and taken to a prison commonly referred to as the "Hanoi Hilton."

Years later, as McCain reflected on this period, he said he held no ill will toward his captors.

"I don't blame them. We're in a war," McCain said in a separate interview with C-SPAN in 2017.

"I didn't like it, but at the same time when you are in a war and you are captured by the enemy, you can't expect to have tea," McCain said.

Because of the prominence of McCain's family, his captors saw in him potential for propaganda and offered him early release. But McCain repeatedly refused the offer because his fellow POWs would not be released as well.

He spoke about that shortly after his release in 1973.

"A number of times they were strong in their tactics trying to get me to possibly embarrass my father and our country," McCain said.

He spent most of his time in solitary confinement and endured incessant torture.

His ordeal as a POW, however, helped fuel his political career. As a senator, he could speak with authority on military matters. Perhaps the most striking example was when he challenged the George W. Bush administration and its "enhanced interrogation" of terrorism suspects. McCain decried the practice as torture.

McCain has visited the prison where he had been a POW.

"I still despise those who inflicted pain unnecessarily on me and my fellow prisoners, but I hold no ill will toward the Vietnamese people, either North or South," he said.

The former prisoner then talked about his many friendships with many Vietnamese in the years since, adding that he always admired and respected the Vietnamese people.

'Born dancing'

Kemp was also known for his film cameos, appearing as a pub landlord in The Wicker Man in 1973 and as a pantomime dame in the film Velvet Goldmine in 1998.

Born in 1938 near Liverpool, Kemp grew up in South Shields and quickly discovered a vocation in dance.

"I realised that I wanted to dance when I first realised anything at all. I was born dancing," he said.

"For me dancing has always been a shortcut to happiness."

He first saw Ballet Rambert perform at the age of 17 and soon after hitchhiked to London to audition.

Image copyrightMAURIZIO DEGL'INNOCENTI/EPA/REX/SHUTTERSTOCKImage captionLindsay Kemp performing Kemp Dreams Kabuki Courtesan in Florence, Italy, in June 2017Image copyrightALAMYImage captionKemp was described as "so charismatic, so full of life"

He won a scholarship, but needed to complete his military service first.

Kemp told BBC Newsnight in 2016: "I had a fairly tough time in the Air Force, because I didn't march… I danced."

He studied under expressionist dancer Hilde Holger and French mime Marcel Marceau before forming his own dance company in the 1960s.

Inspiring

In 1966, Kemp met David Bowie after a performance in Covent Garden when the singer was 19.

"He came to my dressing room and he was like the archangel Gabriel standing there, I was like Mary," he said.

"It was love at first sight."

Bowie became his student and his lover, performing in Kemp's show, Pierrot in Turquoise and gaining the theatrical inspiration for Ziggy Stardust.

"He was certainly multi-faceted, a chameleon, splendid, inspiring, a genius of a creature. But I did show him how to do it," Kemp said.

Image copyrightGETTY IMAGESImage captionLindsay Kemp performing as Salome in Toronto in 1978Image copyrightGETTY IMAGESImage captionIn off-duty mode, Kemp poses outside the theatre in the same yearImage copyrightGETTY IMAGESImage captionKemp appearing in the play Flowers with long-term collaborator David Haughton in 1975

He also taught Kate Bush to dance, describing her as a shy performer who nevertheless was "dynamic" when she began to move.

The singer later dedicated the song Moving to him, pushing a copy under the door of his London flat.

Kemp said: "It was a very moving experience, because I didn't know she was a singer."

He made his mark on the world of modern dance with shows such as Cruel Garden, a collaboration with Christopher Bruce at Ballet Rambert.

March 21, 2018

It is with great sadness that Ol Pejeta Conservancy and the Dvůr Králové Zoo announce that Sudan, the world’s last male northern white rhino, age 45, died at Ol Pejeta Conservancy in Kenya on March 19th, 2018 (yesterday). #SudanForever#TheLoneBachelorGone#Only2Left

The world's last surviving male northern white rhino has died after months of poor health, his carers say.

Sudan, who was 45, lived at the Ol Pejeta Conservancy in Kenya. He was put to sleep on Monday after age-related complications worsened significantly.

His death leaves only two females - his daughter and granddaughter - of the subspecies alive in the world.

"His death is a cruel symbol of human disregard for nature and it saddened everyone who knew him," said Jan Stejskal, an official at Dvur Kralove Zoo in the Czech Republic, where Sudan had lived until 2009.

"But we should not give up," he added in quotes carried by AFP news agency.

"We must take advantage of the unique situation in which cellular technologies are utilised for conservation of critically endangered species. It may sound unbelievable, but thanks to the newly developed techniques even Sudan could still have an offspring." Why is this kind of rhino so rare?

Rhinoceroses - of which there are five species - are the second-largest land mammal after elephants. The white rhinoceros consists of two sub-species: the southern white rhino and the much rarer and critically endangered northern white rhino.

Sudan, who was the equivalent of 90 in human years, was the last surviving male of the rarer variety after the natural death of a second male in late 2014.

The subspecies' population in Uganda, Central African Republic, Sudan and Chad was largely wiped out during the poaching crisis of the 1970s and 1980s. Poaching was fuelled by demand for rhino horn for use in traditional Chinese medicine, and for dagger handles in Yemen.

March 13, 2018

Craig Mack, the rapper best known for the classic '90s single "Flava In Ya Ear," has died. Richard Harvey of the Colleton County Coroner's office confirmed to NPR Music that Mack died in his home near Walterboro, S.C., around 9 p.m. on March 12, of natural causes. He was 47.

Mack initially released music under the moniker MC EZ in the late 1980s. But it was Mack's Grammy-nominated, platinum-selling 1994 song "Flava In Ya Ear" that made his name. The song was the first single released by Sean Combs' then-fledgling record label Bad Boy Entertainment. Propelled by the hit, Mack released his debut album, Project Funk da World, in September, 1994 — another track from the record, "Get Down" also received gold certification, along with the album itself. After that success, Mack left Bad Boy to release his sophomore album, Operation: Get Down,in 1997.

Mack subsequently retreated from music, maintaining a quiet life in South Carolina. There, Mack joined the Overcomer Ministry, a congregation led by controversialevangelist Ralph Gordon Stair, who was charged this past December with a litany of offenses, including three counts of criminal sexual conduct. A video which surfaced around 2012 shows Stair beginning an introduction by proclaiming: "Crack Mack is dead! We have somebody who usedto be Craig Mack — and he didn't join [our church], God joined him." Afterwards, Mack addresses the congregation, responding to Stair's question of what he used to "do" out in the world by answering: "Wickedness."

Easy Mo Bee, the producer behind "Flava In Ya Ear," shared on social media that he last talked to the rapper on the phone about three months ago. Bee wrote:

"Most of the call was me trying to persuade him to start making music again. He felt like after giving his life to God that maybe he shouldn't rap again," Easy Mo Bee wroteon Instagram. "I begged him and explained to him that he had every right to still praise God through his music. I told him that as long as it was genuine and not a blasphemous gimmick, he could still reach souls and spread his message. Finally, he gave in and said 'Ok Mo Bee, i'll do it.' I sent him 5 or 6 tracks and then I never heard back from him. I made a follow-up call and still no Craig. Maybe he knew he was about to die but just didn't want to tell me ... I pray that today he has finally made it into the Kingdom Of Heaven because that's all that mattered to him."

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